Sen. Bernie Sanders Asks NSA If Agency Has Spied On Congress

[cal04]

U.S. Sen Bernie Sanders (I-VT) asked the National Security Agency in a letter Friday if it had spied on members of Congress.

Sanders cited recent revelations that the NSA has collected information on American citizens, actions that he called "clearly unconstitutional," and spied on foreign leaders.

"I am writing today to ask you one very simple question. Has the NSA spied, or is the NSA spying, on members of Congress or other American elected officials?" he wrote in the letter to NSA director Keith Alexander.

Sanders said "spying" would include collecting so-called "metadata" -- which includes date and times of phone calls, along with length and duration -- as well as the content of Internet history and emails.

http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/bernie-sanders-nsa-spying-on-congress

[Purveyor]

1. This ought to be fun. Thanks for posting! eom

[SummerSnow]

2. "Of course we did, and boy oh boy you guys been naughty"

could you imagine how many heads would roll?

[mindwalker_i]

6. I'm deathly afraid the number would be zero

"Mmmm, a fuck, we do not give," would be most of Congress' answer

[BlueCaliDem]

3. With the unethical behavior of Issa and his fellow Repukes,

I sure freakin' hope the NSA are!

[WillyT]

4. HUGE K & R !!! - THANK YOU !!!

[Cleita]

5. I think the Pentagon and other agencies probably think of Bernie Sanders as

a crazy uncle you can ignore. He needs to get a caucus of senators and congressmen to back him up so they pay attention to the seriousness of the question he's asking.

[Scuba]

7. My dream: The answer is 'yes' and an FOIA request makes it all public.

As a result, wholesale changes in both the House and Senate.

[OnyxCollie]

8. K&R. nt

[valerief]

9. Their response: Does a bear shit in the woods? nt

[Stuart G]

10. K And R.....

And I wouldn't be surprised if Bernie was someone the NSA spied on..

[cloudbase]

11. NSA's response here:

[BlueCheese]

12. Well, they spied on everyone...

So they spied on members of Congress.

I suppose Sanders is asking if they looked specifically at the data they have on members of Congress. I'm very curious about that as well. However, we've already seen that intelligence officials have no trouble lying outright to Congress, so who knows if we'll get an honest answer.

[thesquanderer]

13. Brilliant. Finally something that might get Congress' attention.

Because of course the things that matter most to them are the things that affect them.

[kentuck]

14. Of course they have!

And they are. I don't doubt it for an instant.

[ChazInAz]

15. That would explain something.

There's bound to be LOTS of blackmail fodder in both Chambers. Perhaps that's why spending on Defense and Homeland Security never seems to get cut.

[zeemike]

16. Yes and I think many of them know they are spied on.

And know that the NSA has dirt on most of them.
And that makes it easy for them to stay in power and never get their budget cut...J Edgar Hover proved that works.

[Agony]

17. That's the ticket... get 'em on the record. Thank You, Sen. Sanders. nt

[JoeyT]

18. Did they give him the least untruthful answer?

I've got a feeling they're not going to answer at all. Real authority doesn't answer to some petty elected officials like it was in some kind of a democracy.